it had ever existed. Yet it had jolted through him anyway, unmistakable and unwelcome, when he’d looked across the bar and seen her sitting there, looking … oddly bereft.
It roared back through him now, as she flirted with him, her lush lips parting slightly as she ran a deliberate finger along the lower one. Tempting him. Luring him. Making him think back to the sweet perfection of her legs wrapped tightly around his hips. The taste of that perfect, wicked mouth. But he was no longer the kind of man who bowed down to his appetites, especially when they were as self-destructive as this one. Especially when he knew exactly how little a woman like Larissa had to offer to a man in his position, a man who preferred to think about his reputation before his pleasure these days. And her reputation was about as black and dire as they came.
“Nice try,” he said dismissively, as if his body wasn’t hard and ready just looking at her. Not that he would let that matter. “But one taste of that was more than enough.”
He thought he saw something move through her green eyes then, but it was gone with a blink, and she only smiled at him. That dangerous, mysterious smile of hers, like a siren’s song, that tempted him to forget all he knew. That tempted him to simply lean forward, put his hands on her lush little body, yank her mouth to his, and taste her.
“Oh, Jack,” she murmured, her voice little more than a purr, the timbre of it seeming to pool in his groin, then light a path of fire across his skin. “That’s what they all say. At first.”
He wished she wasn’t so good at this. He wished he wasn’t so affected. He wished he could look at her and see what he knew to be the truth of her—instead of that elegant, vulnerable line of her neck, the exposed turn of her delicate jaw, that made him want to comfort her, however insane that urge was. He wished that the short, inky-black hair did not suit her so much more than it should have. It made her seem more serious, more substantial.
But he knew better. He knew what she was. What she’d done. Every dirty detail. He knew everything there was to know about her, and it didn’t matter how small or helpless she might appear on the surface. He knew that she was soulless beneath. Like all the rest of them in that world he’d left behind. Just like he had been, before he’d grown up.
Looking at her was like looking into a mirror he’d deliberately broken five years ago, and he disliked what he saw. He always would. And she’d been the one to hold that mirror up to him in the first place. How could he ever forget that?
“There will be a ferry leaving at dawn on Friday,” he said coldly, abruptly, his voice showing none of the roughness within. “I want you on it.”
She laughed. It was a silvery sound, magical. It made him wish for things that he knew better than to believe in, and he blamed her for that, too.
“Are you ordering me off this island?” she asked, looking delighted at the prospect. And not in the least bit intimidated by him, which, it hurt him to admit, he found more attractive than he should. “How dictatorial. I might swoon.”
Jack eyed her. This was his refuge. His escape. He hid here in the dark, grim winter months when none of the well-heeled tourists and summer residents were around—New England’s and Manhattan’s oldest money in their ancient family homes and compounds, cluttering up the island and hoarding all the summer sunshine for themselves as if it was their rightful due. He preferred it here now, in these forgotten months, when he didn’t have to be Jack Endicott Sutton, too-eligible heir to two magnificent American fortunes, and yet still the bane of his grandfather’s august existence. Here, he did not have to think about his duty. Here, he could breathe without worrying how each exhalation reflected on his suitability to manage the Endicott Foundation, his family’s prominent charitable foundation. Here, tucked away in the worst of the unforgiving Maine weather, shoulder to shoulder with lobstermen and fishermen who respected only the sea—and only sometimes at that—he was just Jack.
He couldn’t have Larissa Whitney polluting this place, playing God only knew what kind of games in the closest thing he had to a sanctuary. It was unthinkable. And he suspected he could guess what she was doing so far from her preferred glittering, high-end stomping grounds. Down east Maine in the off-season, subject to the treacherous weather and notably bereft of breathless page-six gossip, was no place for a spoiled, pampered, overly indulged party girl. There were no parties here. No press. No screaming, adoring masses on every corner, ready to copy her clothes and sell her secrets to the highest bidder. None of the things someone like Larissa considered basics for survival. He was afraid he could guess what had brought her here, and he didn’t like it at all.
“You haven’t bothered to ask what I’m doing here,” he pointed out, searching the smooth mask of her beautiful face, so adored by so many, for clues, but of course, there was nothing there. There never was. Nothing she didn’t want him to see. Nothing to see at all, he thought. He was annoyed that he even looked for anything more. “Is that your usual self-absorption, or did you expect to see me when you got here?”
“You tossed open the door like a modern-day Heathcliff,” she murmured, as if transported into rapturous daydreams by the very idea. He didn’t believe her for a moment. Like all of her peers, all saddled with names that dated back to the origin of the country, and to the lauded coal, steel and robber-baron fortunes that had built it, she could be a fantastic actress when it suited her. But could she be anything else? And why did he still want to know?
“It’s all very romantic,” she said when he only gazed at her. She shrugged. “I’d hate all the gritty little travel details—your itinerary, my schedule, so boring—to ruin such a delicious moment.”
“I think I know why you’re here,” he said, ignoring her flirtatious little performance. Her games might have worked on him once, he told himself, but they wouldn’t again. His voice lowered. “Did you really think this would work, Larissa? Have you forgotten that I know how you operate?”
She blinked, and he had the impression that for that moment, she truly had no idea what he meant. But then he reminded himself that this—precisely this—was what she was best at.
She leaned forward then, putting her hand high on his thigh and letting her body sway toward his and, no, Jack thought. He’d been wrong. This was what she was best at. This effortless seduction. With just a touch, using only her proximity. She was irresistible and she knew it. Lethal.
So close, her unique fragrance seemed to fill his head, spinning it—a hint of unusual, expensive spices, edgy and intriguing. And the cream of her skin was scented a warm, intoxicating vanilla. He remembered far more than he wanted to, more than he was comfortable admitting even to himself. Her taste, her scent. The wild passion that he’d long since decided he’d imagined, embellished. But there was no imagining this. Her hand burned through his jeans, searing into his flesh, stirring him, reminding him exactly how much he’d wanted her—and still did. But that didn’t mean he had to give into it. Or even like it. Or her.
He stood, watching her hand fall away. Part of him wanted to reach out and put his own hands on her, all over her. Relearn her curves, her cries. Lose himself in her.
But he was no longer that man. He’d graduated from the kind of games Larissa played five years ago, and he wasn’t going back.
“Friday,” he said, his voice commanding. Sure of her instant obedience. “The ferry. Six-thirty in the morning. It’s not a request.”
“I appreciate the update on the ferry schedule,” she said evenly. Once again, he saw something he didn’t understand in her green gaze—something that didn’t make sense. She didn’t look away, and he found he couldn’t decipher her. And surely, she should be an
